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Lot Essay
Ralph Jentsch has confirmed the authenticity of this work.
Between 1924 and 1932, Grosz created a number of large Berlin street scenes such as the present work, which was drawn circa 1926. These works, according to Ralph Jentsch, "belong to the most important component in the artist's oeuvre of these years." Grosz had an interest in depicting all kinds of people walking through the busy city streets—the rich, the poor, the elderly, the children. Jentsch has described the present work as a "friendly scene", one "probably taking place in the busy Westend of the city, like on Kurfürstendamm or the short stretch of Tauentziehnstraβe. In the center of the drawing, there walks a neatly dressed rich couple while two women are looking at a posh window display of leather suitcases. Only by a poor cripple on the left, wearing a sign on his coat with the inscription 'Ganz blind und Taubstumm' ('Totally blind and deaf'), is one reminded that there is also a shadow side of the lively metropolis, still the consequence of a murderous and irresponsible war Germany had launched in the neighboring countries of France and Belgium."
Between 1924 and 1932, Grosz created a number of large Berlin street scenes such as the present work, which was drawn circa 1926. These works, according to Ralph Jentsch, "belong to the most important component in the artist's oeuvre of these years." Grosz had an interest in depicting all kinds of people walking through the busy city streets—the rich, the poor, the elderly, the children. Jentsch has described the present work as a "friendly scene", one "probably taking place in the busy Westend of the city, like on Kurfürstendamm or the short stretch of Tauentziehnstraβe. In the center of the drawing, there walks a neatly dressed rich couple while two women are looking at a posh window display of leather suitcases. Only by a poor cripple on the left, wearing a sign on his coat with the inscription 'Ganz blind und Taubstumm' ('Totally blind and deaf'), is one reminded that there is also a shadow side of the lively metropolis, still the consequence of a murderous and irresponsible war Germany had launched in the neighboring countries of France and Belgium."